The Rise of the Nacirema and the Descent of European Man: A Response to Manuel A. Vásquez’s More than Belief
In: Method & Theory in the Study of ReligionSearch for other papers by Sylvester A. Johnson in
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Abstract
Manuel Vásquez’s Beyond Belief richly examines the prospects of rooting the study of religion more seriously within the imperatives of materialist theory. His study also prompts scholars to consider how attention to the body has been shaped by race and empire. In this essay, I reflect on how the linkage of religion, race, and empire has shaped the imperial history of imagining dark bodies and matter more broadly. I conclude that the ethnographic turn within studies of Western religious subjects signals an important, generative shift in scholarship, one that enables a more rigorous, materially-centered interpretation of Western religious subjectivity.
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The historian Donald Mathews (2004) has also examined this problem of ritual murder as part of white religion in the American South.
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The Rise of the Nacirema and the Descent of European Man: A Response to Manuel A. Vásquez’s More than Belief
In: Method & Theory in the Study of ReligionSearch for other papers by Sylvester A. Johnson in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Abstract
Manuel Vásquez’s Beyond Belief richly examines the prospects of rooting the study of religion more seriously within the imperatives of materialist theory. His study also prompts scholars to consider how attention to the body has been shaped by race and empire. In this essay, I reflect on how the linkage of religion, race, and empire has shaped the imperial history of imagining dark bodies and matter more broadly. I conclude that the ethnographic turn within studies of Western religious subjects signals an important, generative shift in scholarship, one that enables a more rigorous, materially-centered interpretation of Western religious subjectivity.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 1022 | 104 | 27 |
| Full Text Views | 239 | 9 | 0 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 161 | 18 | 0 |